Peshawar: Militants unleashed a ferocious car bomb attack on a police station in Pakistan’s restive northwest, followed by a deadly ambush on responding forces, killing at least 14 officers, police said on Sunday.
Photographs from the site show the scale of destruction, with the station reduced to piles of debris and the area strewn with bricks, scorched remains and mangled vehicles. The wreckage indicated the force of the blast, which left the outpost almost entirely flattened, Reuters reported.
Police officer Sajjad Khan announced that “the bodies of 14 officers had been recovered from the collapsed outpost and three other personnel found alive were rushed to hospital.”
Another police officer recounted the sequence of events, saying that militants rammed into the post with an explosive-filled vehicle and then entered the premises and began firing on any remaining officers.
“Other law enforcement personnel were sent to help the police, but the terrorists ambushed them and caused some casualties,” he said.
The militants reportedly used drones for the operation.
Amid the mayhem, ambulances from hospitals and rescue units rushed to the spot. A state of emergency was imposed at Bannu government hospitals to manage casualties.
The Ittehad-ul-Mujahideen — a coalition of insurgent groups active along the Afghan frontier — claimed responsibility for the attack, sources told news agencies.
This latest attack underscores persistent insurgent risks in Pakistan’s border areas, with the potential to inflame tensions anew along the Afghan frontier.
Pakistan and Afghanistan, erstwhile allies, witnessed their worst violence in years this February, sparked by Pakistani airstrikes into Afghan soil that Islamabad claimed targeted militant strongholds.
Skirmishes have simmered down to intermittent bouts along the border, but no formal truce exists. Islamabad accuses Kabul of harbouring raiders who slip in from Afghanistan; the Taliban rebuts, calling Pakistan’s militancy a domestic issue.
